


One Life From Many Deaths

by Destina



Category: Batman Begins (2005)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-12-16
Updated: 2005-12-16
Packaged: 2018-01-25 04:26:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1631450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Destina/pseuds/Destina





	One Life From Many Deaths

 

 

_I. The Boy_

 

Bruce's tie was strangling him. He reached to pull it loose, then remembered his mother's admonition that in public there was etiquette to be followed. He was a young man now, old enough to attend the opera. He wasn't a boy any longer. Time to forget about what he wanted, and learn all the things a man had to do.

Lights flashed across the water standing in the street -- red, then blue, then red. He squinted and turned his face away, but something caught his eye: a single pearl in a puddle at the edge of the alley, half-submerged in the muddy water. He watched it for a while, noticed the way the light reflected off the surface and made tiny shimmering rainbows. In the back of his mind, his mother's scream echoed, softer, softer still, falling in octaves like pearls from a snapped string.

It occurred to him at some point -- perhaps when the officers were murmuring to each other about who they should call to come for him, or when they covered his parents with blankets and stood silent beside the bodies -- that he would have nothing by which to remember his parents. In that moment, he could not see his mother's face in his mind's eye, and he turned his head to stare at the formless lump beneath the dull blue blanket. Then he directed his blurry gaze at the pearl.

A dozen policemen were huddled around him, as if their bodies could provide retroactive protection against death. But that moment had come and gone, and his father's face had been cold and damp in his hands, like the ground beneath him. Bruce tried to push his way gently through the crowd, tapping the legs of the men who stood in his way. They didn't understand him; he had no words to make them see, so he choked on his explanation. Hands came down to restrain him, more of them each time he pushed them away. Arms enfolded him, so he slapped and kicked, and the harder they pulled and tightened, the more he squirmed.

"Mister Wayne!" one of them said to him, as if shocked to see such behavior, but Bruce was no more Mister Wayne than he was king of the moon. Mister Wayne was -- _had been_ \-- his father. He broke free and ran, falling to his knees in the muck, and retrieved the pearl. All the light around him seemed to gather into one point of brilliance, nestled in the palm of his hand.

"Son." A man's voice, soft, in an attempt to reassure. Bruce flinched. He wasn't anyone's son, not ever again. "We'll have to take you back to the station, now. Get a good description of the man who did this."

Bruce nodded. Something descended around his shoulders, something big and soft that smelled of his father's cologne. He pitched the coat violently from his body. One of the policemen bent and picked it up, then began to slide it over his shoulders again. Bruce pushed his hands away; a strangled noise escaped him, not quite a sob.

"Give that coat to me," the man said.

"He'll catch cold, Jim."

"I'll see he doesn't." A moment later a policeman knelt before him, red and blue lights reflecting off his glasses, and curled his big, warm fingers around Bruce's hand. Bruce began to pull away, but in the policeman's outstretched palm, four more pearls glowed gently against the alley's dim lamplight.

"These are yours, too," the policeman said, and tucked them into Bruce's pocket. They weighed against his chest like giant stones. He squeezed Bruce's hand, then stood and moved out of Bruce's way. Bruce could see him from the corner of his eye, standing between Bruce and his parents' bodies, keeping the others away.

Bruce clenched his fist around the single pearl he'd rescued until his hands stopped shaking. His fault, for acting like a kid, for being scared of stupid fake monsters he knew weren't real. His fault, for not hearing what his mother tried to tell him, for not growing up fast enough. He knew he would never make that mistake again.

 

_II. The Traveler_

 

In London he called himself Michael Bradley, and he traded his shoes for a bare mattress in a youth hostel. It was the best sleep he'd had in years. In the morning he pocketed oranges and apples at a corner store, then moved on to slipping bags of chips and cookies into the recesses of his jacket. By the time he moved up to pilfering wallets from Trafalgar tourists, he could pretend to minimal skill in his newly chosen profession, and it wasn't far from the truth. He left before the Yard could pin him down. A ship was always waiting, unguarded, and he owned the world just the way every other citizen did: everything within arm's reach, at any given moment.

After he arrived in Athens, he went two days without food or water. He sold his $35,000 watch for enough change to buy vegetables and hunkered down at the wharf, waiting for another ship to come. Bruce watched the harbor lights sparkling on the water and thought of all the comforts of home, just one phone call away. The concept of self-sufficiency burned at the back of his mind, obliterating soft beds and an easy life built on a foundation of death.

In Amsterdam he adopted a new name, one that was easily forgotten, and set about charming young ladies out of anything they would give him -- money, meals, expensive wines, the warmth of their beds -- all without knowing a single word of Dutch. It was cold when he arrived, and he soon discovered that he wasn't averse to charming young men, either, if he was shivering hard enough. A man named Willem took Bruce back to his loft and fed him a thick tasty soup, then fucked him face-down on the mattress with his right hand pressing down on Bruce's neck and his fingers bruising Bruce's hip. Bruce shuddered and moaned under Willem's methodical fucking, but remembered not to speak. Too much risk of being the wrong man, of being misunderstood in any language.

In Paris, Bruce longed to be himself again, just for a moment, when he was reduced to stealing brick-hard bread and lurking in the alleys behind trendy cafes, waiting for the night's trash to hit the dumpster. He thought of the wallet he'd burned in Gotham's Narrows, the bright flash of fire when his past went up in a wisp of smoke, but those thoughts quickly turned to resolve. He had a passable grasp of French, and was easily understood. This was not the place to learn what he needed to know.

When he reached Taiwan, he settled in with a gang of street thieves and called himself John Doe, just for laughs. They didn't get the joke. He used the rags of his expensive shirt to clean the filthy apartment he rented. Even with the chatter and bustle on all sides to distract him, he could find no peace.

Of all the places he stopped, China was the country where he felt least at home. He knew nothing of the language or the culture, and there were no acquaintances there as a fall-back in case he should weaken, so China was the place he was most comfortable. From petty thievery to organized crime, he tried his hand at everything and found a surprising aptitude for the very things he despised. He earned street cred on a fake name that was sufficiently blackened by his deeds in Taiwan. Every shipment from Wayne Enterprises was fair game; it was all a reminder that somewhere, someone carried on his father's work, but it wasn't his world any longer.

It was almost a relief to get caught in the act, to realize he had no possessions left to his name, even to inhabit a freezing cold cell and defend his body against invasion and assault. He'd faced prison before; he'd lived in one all his life, a dark gray place built on the foundations of vengeance and regret. This was a world he'd grown to appreciate. Any life lived on the edges of pain and grief felt like home.

 

_III. The Student_

 

The terms Ducard used were unfamiliar to Bruce, so their meaning became the marks wrought on Bruce's body, on his psyche; those were the hallmarks of Henri's tutelage.

 _Shinobi-iri:_ Making his limbs silent, moving through space without leaving a sign to betray his presence. This was most difficult, since Bruce felt noisy and obvious, even when he tried his best to be graceful. It didn't seem to come naturally. Hour after hour he practiced climbing in silence, dropping from rafters and off balconies without exhaling his held breath. He even learned to erase his footprints from fresh-fallen snow.

Wherever he was, even if he believed himself to be alone, Ducard was there with him. Often Henri said nothing. He only watched as if waiting for the moment Bruce would become truly invisible. In Henri's sight, Bruce felt all too visible, observed; he felt as though he could not fully disappear. He felt as though he might not _wish_ to disappear, given a choice. The thought sent troubled shivers over his skin.

Bruce ran across the low steppes by Ducard's side in the mornings, then up the sloping side of the mountain. He learned to tread lightly, to move without dislodging even the smallest pebbles. When he reached the highest plateau, out of breath, Henri felled him with a single punch to his jaw, stealing the last of his air and knocking him on his ass. He lay on his back in the cold sunlight with Henri's knee weighing him down. "You must place limited trust in your allies, for even those closest to you may betray you," Henri said, tracing the incipient bruise on Bruce's jaw with a gloved finger.

Bruce bit back his reply, and Henri rose, removing his weight from Bruce's body. He offered a hand up, which Bruce took with some suspicion. He rarely had to be taught a lesson twice.

 _Intonjutsu:_ Using the gifts of nature to conceal, to evade, to escape. Henri described it as finding a way home, but Bruce thought to himself that he was beyond that need. He practiced entering and leaving rooms without a sound, climbing into and out of buildings with openings made for men half his size.

He mixed the powders until his fingertips were blackened by their chemicals. Henri taught him how to achieve the subtle balance between deadly and showy, and when to apply them. Bruce learned which powders were toxic, and which merely incapacitated, but he didn't possess Henri's skill as a chemist.

At the end of each session he washed Henri's hands, ritually, one finger at a time, until the stains and residue were cleansed away. Often his fingers tangled with Henri's, long moments where he could touch with impunity, and he took those opportunities whenever they arose. He didn't pretend it was an accident; Henri only smiled, and dried his hands, and went about his business.

 _Seishin-teki kyoyo:_ The art of spiritual refinement. This was the first discipline Henri introduced, and the only one Bruce never mastered. Each day they meditated together in Henri's quarters beside an urn of stinking incense. Bruce learned to ignore the stench a bit at a time, until one day it was as if the smoke had no odor at all.

At such times, Henri would probe Bruce's past, as skillful as a surgeon removing cancerous tumors. His questions could make it seem as if the barriers Bruce had so carefully built were never there at all.

"Tell me about Gotham City," Henri said one afternoon, while sunlight crept in through the slatted windows and the smoky rich trails of incense lingered.

Bruce couldn't quite tell what lay beneath such a deceptively neutral question. "I haven't thought of it in a long time," he answered truthfully. "What do you want to know?"

"What do you think of, when you remember it?"

Death. Anger. "Friends. Family."

"Not the rampant crime and corruption? Interesting." Henri tossed a few sticks on the fire and left the verbal prompt there in the air between them.

Bruce shifted uncomfortably. "Everyone I've ever cared about is there."

"You are emotionally attached to your friends, and because of what you left behind, the city has taken on sentimental value for you. You must learn to step back, to see things through a transparent lens of objectivity." Henri watched him, looking for signs of comprehension -- or weakness. Bruce met his gaze steadily. Henri had his own way of viewing the cause of justice, and Bruce was not inclined to argue the point. Not anymore.

They sat without speaking for many minutes. Then Bruce said, "Cities aren't just the sum of the corruption within their borders."

"Lot offered that argument to God, and even God could not be swayed by it," Henri said. "The weight of the sins of Gomorrah led to her eventual destruction." He was still watching Bruce. Waiting for something, perhaps for Bruce to contradict him. "So it will be with Gotham."

The bats came to Bruce in his sleep that night for the first time in many years, enfolding him with wings of steel. They pulled him deeper into the dream-fed darkness until he was as blind as they were, and as hungry.

 

_IV. The Master_

 

They began the _bojutsu_ training with sticks, blunt instruments of instruction that left deep black bruises wherever they struck home. Henri was careful, but he gave no quarter. Bruce found himself sprawled on the ground time and time again, hour after hour, until by the end of the day he could no longer move. His muscles barely retained the strength to lift him to his feet, and he staggered to his bed for dreamless sleep.

"What purpose does guilt serve?" Henri asked him once, when he drove the end of the stick into Bruce's ribs, not hard enough to crack them, though they would ache for days. "Why dwell on the past?"

"The past gives me purpose," Bruce gasped, then gritted his teeth and swung his stick down, a sweeping arc that missed Henri entirely. He didn't have the breath to waste on cursing, but it seemed he had learned nothing in all his years of training. Henri could dodge even the quickest blow. Bruce knew he was telegraphing his intent. He would learn what his weakness was in that area, and when he did, he was going to give Henri the shock of his life.

"And yet you continue to say you have no wish for vengeance," Henri said, a knowing smirk twisting the corner of his mouth. He moved them in a circle, content to let Bruce strike first, and Bruce sought an opening. He heard Henri's words distantly, as if from the top of a different mountain. "To be so consumed by a single event in your life can be productive; it focuses your rage. But you will find it burns through you, leaving nothing behind, if you cannot channel it."

"I use it to--" Bruce broke off with a grunt of pain as the last three inches of Henri's stick struck his shoulder. Pain coursed through him like the ringing of a bell, resonating along the nerves of his arm. His hand opened involuntarily and his stick dropped away. Bruce leaned to the side and scrambled away, kicking the stick before him. "--remember what's important," he finished, picking up the stick with his left hand.

Just for show, he flourished it with a twist. Henri paid no attention to the maneuver. His stick flashed out, catching Bruce's in mid-spin and knocking it into the air. Bruce's fingers twisted with it and he cried out, both hands now useless.

Henri stepped in to press the end of his stick into Bruce's chest, digging into the deepest bruise there, though it was hidden by Bruce's shirt. He held Bruce's gaze as Bruce winced. "What is important is survival," he said, pressing harder, until the pain took Bruce's breath away. "To be distracted by trivial matters is to forfeit your life. You can have no obstacles; you can allow no one inside your circle. You must know what you wish to accomplish, and you can allow nothing to interfere."

"No _one_ ," Bruce said softly.

"No one," Henri agreed. "Not even your parents' ghosts."

Bruce closed his eyes, and the words drifted up from nowhere, unrelated to anything Henri had said or done. "My father's death wasn't his fault."

"Is that your emotional reaction, or your reasoned conclusion?" When Bruce didn't answer, Henri went on, "Be certain you've formed your opinion on the basis of something more substantial than sentimental outrage."

Bruce's jaw tightened, but he said nothing.

Henri stepped back, pushing Bruce hard enough to stagger him. "The blame lies with the man who stands passively by and allows the world to conquer him," he said, striking Bruce twice in the chest, once with each end of the stick. Anger simmered beneath Bruce's skin, sparking slowly to life. He glanced to the left to see what had become of his own staff; too far away to reach before Henri could disable him. He tried not to hear the words, tried to be the man who was beyond caring about the past, but he was not yet that man.

Henri was relentless; he dropped his truths like calculated blows to the heart. "Your father was a coward. He was an intellectual; his intelligence was ultimately useless. And you had better recognize that, lest you become what he was. Lest you allow yourself to be ruled by useless emotions." Another strike, and another. Pain bloomed beneath Bruce's skin, a slow heat spreading across his body.

"We've been over this," Bruce hissed through gritted teeth. With one hand he grabbed for Henri's stick, missed it.

"Yet you revisit it, not I. You cannot change what was, Bruce. Only what will be. You can be strong. You can be everything he was not."

The harsh words cut through Bruce's pain. Like a taut cord snapping, he launched himself at Henri, coming in past the rain of blows. He knocked Henri down, both of them hitting the floor so hard their breath rushed out of them. His fist connected with Henri's face, once, twice, knuckles driving sharp into bone and soft flesh. Henri absorbed the strikes, turned his head back to watch Bruce, to see how far he would go.

Bruce curled his fist into a tight ball and struck the floor, again, again, again, over and over until he had nothing but agony to cling to. Blood rose to the surface of his skin, spotting his knuckles and spattering across the floor, over Henri's face.

"Enough," Henri snapped, reaching up to restrain him. Bruce knew he was wild, beyond the point of stopping, but he could not find anything to hold him, to stay his hand. He struck at the air, flailing, until Henri threw him off and pinned Bruce with his entire weight, panting, his eyes narrowed.

Bruce stopped struggling and focused on Henri's face. He wanted so much, so many things he'd pushed aside in pursuit of the tools to wage this war, but he'd been so intent that he'd lost track of the chances he missed along the way. Henri's body was warm against his, coiled, but not in a dangerous way.

Not the way Bruce wanted.

He pushed Henri back, straddled him, watched Henri's eyes darken against his intent. "Yield," he ordered, focused on only one thing: that Henri obey his command. A moment later, Henri's strong grip came to bear on his arms and he found himself on his back once again, out-maneuvered. Henri's gaze traveled down to Bruce's lips, then slowly back to meet Bruce's eyes.

"Yield," Henri said, low, as he took hold of Bruce's wrists and held them tightly against the ground. Bruce's heart was racing. He closed his eyes and took a breath, willed his body to stop shaking; his reaction was the intoxication of desire. Henri's loose shirt smelled of smoke, with a faint scent of those damned blue flowers.

Never one to wait until Bruce was ready, Henri kissed him while his eyes were still closed. Henri's mouth covered his, more gently than Bruce would have expected from such a ruthless teacher.

"You _will_ yield," Henri said again, a whisper against Bruce's lips, and Bruce's body responded to the command, leaving no doubt. He tilted his head back and allowed Henri access to his bare skin. Henri released Bruce's hands, but Bruce didn't move. Not yet. His fingers twitched, shaking with the damage he'd done to them, and he relaxed his fist, letting the pain wash over him.

Henri's broad fingers circled the bare expanse of Bruce's throat, and Bruce called to mind that moment on the mountain, the warning not to trust. Slowly, he drew in a breath as Henri's hands tightened, capable of crushing the life from him. His eyes narrowed as Henri leaned closer, breathing a word against his ear: "Better." The pressure eased, but Bruce had no chance to breathe deeply; Henri's mouth was on his again, a reward for passing some unknowable test.

Henri's hands slid beneath Bruce's open shirt, seeking contact with his skin. A sharp intake of breath when the connection was made; Henri's kisses deepened, his tongue stroking against Bruce's. It was the first time Bruce had been touched this way in so long that he had nearly forgotten the power of simple contact, of a touch that was not meant to destroy. He tensed again, but Henri's thumbs stroked over bruises old and new, carefully avoiding the freshest wound. He loosened Bruce's trousers, wasting no time, while Bruce bucked up against him. Only then did he lift his hands and strip Henri of his shirt, baring lean muscle to his touch.

Henri's shoulder was scarred, the skin rough against Bruce's cheek. He bit down on a cry when Henri's fingers closed tight around his cock and began to move, relentlessly pressing his advantage here as he had with words and weapons, dragging Bruce toward his climax. Bruce pressed his fingers into the shape of the brand, tracing the jagged outline. This was what it meant to be a part of something greater than his own pain and anger, to have a cause worth fighting for. He had searched for the ideal and found it in a man who was flawed and full of rage, just like himself.

"Your mark will be here," Henri said, and bit down on Bruce's shoulder. Bruce came with a gasping cry, shuddering against the measured assault of Henri's hands.

For many years after, each night while on the cusp of sleep, he imagined the iron striking into his skin, and Henri's warm tongue tracing the shape of possession there.

 

_V. The Vengeful Warrior_

 

Bruce chose titanium as the base for his hand-held weapons. Plastics and polymers were Fox's province; Bruce needed something harder, something resistant to the corrosion of Gotham's underworld. He shaped the jagged edges of each weapon with his own hands. The pattern of each weapon was extracted from his nightmares, stylized and made concrete; he found his inspiration in the cavern's lurking shadows.

He teased that perhaps Alfred should set an apple on his head and stand as target, but Alfred felt his neck was too valuable to be trusted to Bruce's unproven skills. Bruce smiled and let it go. Alfred had faith in Bruce, and pride in his plans, but he had yet to see what Bruce could accomplish with the skills Henri had taught him. Together he and Alfred tested and tweaked, crafting the tools of a trade that had long ago been lost and forgotten in Gotham City.

In the night, beneath a sky filled with thin clouds and a slivered moon, Bruce could sense Falcone's men scuttling around the city. There were a thousand petty rackets to tackle, so many that he could have drawn lots and still hit the jackpot with every ticket, but his interest in Falcone was personal. He indulged himself in the belief that it wasn't revenge, but something much more pure and refined: a need to present a calling card no criminal could ignore.

His prey were predictable, easy to track, though no one had ever bothered to try. He watched from above, noting their movements, the times of their routes. In the lull between trade and transport, he imagined Falcone bent down before him, pleading for his life with Bruce's blade against his neck. In those moments he was his father's son, his teacher's student, wholly himself. Falcone's terror gave him a deep satisfaction that no threat of prosecution could ever match, but there was a promise betrayed at the back of that dream. He discarded his teacher's notions one at a time as he was subsumed by the mask, and by his chosen duty.

When the time came, it was as Bruce had known it would be: none of Falcone's lackeys were true opponents. None of them had any finesse or skill. He could have driven the blade of his hand into their throats, his fingers into their eyes, crushing sight and breath from them with minimal effort. He could have struck any one of a hundred killing blows. He could have told himself it was an accident, an unavoidable consequence of this new brand of urban warfare.

But if they died, he would lose the addictive beauty of their fear, and so he let them live.

He lifted Falcone into the air, let him kick and push against the inevitable, forced him to look down at the tangible evidence of his empire falling apart. Then he removed his gauntlet, just for a moment, to lay his bare hand against Falcone's neck, to feel the rapid pulse hammering beneath his skin. It would be so easy to stop that fluttering, fragile heart; he chose instead to let it continue beating.

 

_VI. The Assassin_

 

The moment Bruce saw Ducard in Gotham, he wanted him again.

Not the way he had before, not with desperation and anger shaping every touch. This want was something closer to need, a desire to be understood for what he was; Henri alone knew what he was. They were not so different, despite the divergence of their methods. Even knowing who Ducard really was, and what his agenda would be, did nothing to curb that strange simmer of desire. Murder didn't ease it. Even chaos and destruction didn't take away the deep aching _want._ Bruce suspected that nothing ever would; he knew he could never allow anyone else to try.

Rubble was strewn across a two-mile radius in all directions. The police cordoned off huge sections of the city, the better to fool its citizens. Batman traced every far-flung bolt, every piece of glass and steel, looking for blood and bone.

He never found any trace of the body. Somehow it made things easier. There was nothing to grieve, and all that Henri had given him had gone cold in Bruce, cold and dead, but for the knowledge he had shared.

Jim Gordon waited for him at the police command post, deserted now except for the bored coroner and a few beat cops. "Find anything?" he asked, speaking to empty shadows. Uncanny, the way he knew Batman was there.

"Nothing."

"Do you know who he was?" Gordon's questions were casual, but Batman knew there was nothing casual about his methods.

"A shadow at the corner of your eye," he replied, looking up. The sky was clear; stars glittered in the empty air, cold and remote.

"Cryptic," Gordon said. "You really go for the dramatics, don't you?"

"You'll get used to it," Batman said. The cowl bit into his skin, an uncomfortable fit.

"You ready to tell me who you are?"

Batman tasted a lingering rain in the air when he turned away. "Just another shadow," he said.

"Right," Gordon sighed. He stood still a moment longer, as if expecting something more. But Batman was already heading deeper into the darkness, becoming a flicker of motion at the corner of Gordon's eye.

 

_VII. The Man_

 

Bruce Wayne carried thousand dollar bills. They were lighter than air, and the money left his hand more easily when he wasn't distracted by small denominations. He made a secret pact with Alfred: one dollar to charity for every dollar spent on destroying the good name of Bruce Wayne.

He allowed it to be said that he was never seen in public with the same woman twice; that he was too ignorant of business to run his own empire; even that his fortune was dwindling due to his reckless pursuits. All these things he encouraged. He smiled into his martini glass when women lined up to throw their bodies into his bed, and he plied them with expensive gifts. Some even seemed curious about what made him tick. They were the sort for whom conquest wasn't enough, particularly when they were the conquered.

Bruce knew what Alfred saw, when he looked at the man grown from that boy in the alley. The intrusion of tragedy had shaped a different path than his father would have wanted. He saw the way Alfred's face fell into a wary mask when he treated Bruce's wounds, but Bruce turned his face away in bright light, preferring not to see, or be seen.

There were only so many deaths a man could die and still remain a part of the world; there were some dark spaces Bruce wasn't ready to endure. He had faith in this, if in nothing else: he'd learned how to bury his dead.

 

~end~

 

 

 


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